Lee Woodruff, of the Bob Woodruff Foundation, and CNN "Hero" Jordon Thomas shared their experiences with rehabilitation yesterday at a congressional briefing hosted by Sen Tim Johnson (D-SD) and the Coalition to Preserve Rehabilitation (CPR). The personal accounts of injury, healing, and rehabilitation underscored concerns with 3 Medicare proposals pending before the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, also known as the Super Committee, that would decrease funding for inpatient hospital rehabilitation services and limit access to these services.

Johnson, who sustained a near fatal brain hemorrhage in 2006, said in a press release, "As someone who has seen the benefits of intensive rehabilitation services firsthand, it is important to make sure people understand the value of rehabilitation and how the federal investment in rehabilitation hospital services is cost-effective in the long term."

APTA is a member of CPR, a coalition of national consumer, clinician, and member organizations with the goal of preserving access to medical rehabilitation services.

Lee Woodruff, wife of Bob Woodruff, the ABC News correspondent who sustained a traumatic brain injury in 2006 from a roadside bomb while covering a story in Iraq, said, "Behind the statistics and numbers are people and families, and that's who these cuts affect."

CNN Hero Jordan Thomas, who lost both legs in a scuba diving accident, told attendees that with the help of rehabilitation professionals he didn't ask "if" he could do something, rather he asked "when."